


it's glorious i'd break myself for you

by hissingmiseries



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Age Difference, Angst and Feels, Canon Timeline, Character Study, Coming Out, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-23 00:41:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15594423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hissingmiseries/pseuds/hissingmiseries
Summary: This is version four of Joseph Tate: five-o-clock shadow, knitted jumpers with the collar poking out. Signing his texts with two kisses and a heart. It is a fairly new character but it is one that he thinks he can upkeep, at least for a little while.Graham has seen many different versions of Joe.





	it's glorious i'd break myself for you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bugmadoo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bugmadoo/gifts).



> hi hello yes i'm back and here to cry over joe tate and graham foster and how much they love each other
> 
> contains: gay!graham, struggles with sexuality/internalised homophobia/references to past relationships; canonical illness in a child (sarah); frequent mention of alcoholism and past addiction; a wee bit of a canon divergence so the storyline makes sense (joe never sacked graham); scenes involving fire; minor mention of injury, both past and present; narrator with unaddressed depressive/ptsd symptoms.

  

 

 

-

 

"I'm proud of you," Graham says. Just like that. He could be ordering his morning coffee or asking about the weather with that tone of voice, but Joe knows the tells: flick of his eyebrow, softness at the edges. There is a loneliness to his eyes that could be mistaken for a bad night's sleep. 

Joe blinks at him. There is a newspaper in his hands; his fingers feel nerveless. He wants to run. He wants to stay and listen for eternity. "What?"

"I'm proud," Graham repeats. "Of how you've been for Debbie. And Sarah." He sounds like he loves him. He sounds like his father; not Chris, but his father, a silhouette torn from the fabric that is Joseph Tate. "You've become the best version of yourself."

Graham has seen many versions of Joe.

It's weird. Even Joe doesn't seem to remember who he used to be. Maybe he doesn't want to.

 

Joe says—whispers— "Thank you."

Graham swallows hard, and says nothing.

 

-

 

Joe doesn't know when Graham became his best friend. Somewhere between the Incident With the Vodka and the hut, when Joe pulled Graham out of the fire, blackened and coughing and blind. Graham had clung to him for hours, white-knuckled and sobbing; he had blood on his hands, round his mouth. The air shimmered with heat.

There was always a stoic nature to Graham that Joe envied. The school groundsman with the sad eyes and shaky hands, the one everyone whispered about—stinks of booze, ex-service, did you see him earlier?—who wandered the halls like a ghost. He was hard to read, not just to Joe but to everybody. Most people took it at face value and backed off like they were supposed to, but Joe was fascinated. The look of him, the hollowness—it was far too interesting.

 

Graham also doesn't know when Joe became his best friend. But he's been thinking about it these past few weeks and he thinks it was in the times they'd sit in his rebuilt hut and drink and talk—after school, the smell of Mr Sheen and cans of Bud—and something in Graham's bones had gone  _oh_. 

Here's the thing: Joe doesn't do commitment. Or at least, he never did before.

Graham did once. It didn't work out, so now he tries not to think long-term; he knows how quickly things can be lost. One look away at the wrong time, the wrong hand on the steering wheel. That's all it takes.

But Joseph Tate does not fit that algorithm. He is now so long-term that Graham is convinced he was always there, a permanent add-on, an extension of his self. The part of his soul that split away at birth.

The alternate universe where he got things right.

 

This is version one of Joseph Tate. Baby-faced, dressed in fuck-off trackies and smashing shop windows, locking the headmaster in his suite. Thinking he was indestructible as the world fell down around his ears.

Graham thinks this is his favourite version of Joe, because it is the one where he knew him first.

 

-

 

 _she's getting worse,_  Debbie texts. She doesn't call as much anymore as there isn't much time, between the doctors and the machines beeping and the knot of nerves, dry throat. The impending sense of doom that has surpassed nerves but now feels as real and tangible as the hospital linen or the smell of metal in the ward. There is so much doom there, Debbie wants to grab her coat and run out the door and never come back.

Sarah, who is Debbie's daughter and who is also dying, can't get a transplant. The list is as long as her arm yet none of them are suitable.

Joe is sat in the Woolpack, phone in his hand. He is kept up to date by Whatsapp. He can't believe he cares this much.

 

This is version four of Joseph Tate: five-o-clock shadow, knitted jumpers with the collar poking out. Signing his texts with two kisses and a heart. It is a fairly new character but it is one that he thinks he can upkeep, at least for a little while.

 

Charity Dingle is peering over his shoulder, empty pint glasses in her hand. "How are they doing?" she asks.

"Same as always," Joe says. 

That is not the right answer to give. "Okay, and that means—?" She gestures with her hands, with her eyes:  _tell me more, please tell me more, I need to know._

He sighs and puts his phone away. "They still haven't got a transplant."

Charity rolls her eyes; her reaction is more muted than Joe thinks it should be but then he remembers that Charity is a Dingle and it seems to be in their blood, bottling things up, letting it out in silent ripples that short-circuit their surroundings. That is the Dingle way, silent hurricanes, paths of destruction. Of course he'd be attracted to one.

"Unbelievable, isn't it?" Charity groans. "There's a sick child there, and they're seriously telling me they can't find anyone."

"Well—" He swallows. "We just have to be patient."

"Patient," she mocks. Her voice is stressed and tight. Joe thinks that she will probably go grey sometime this year. "We haven't got time to be patient."

This is very true. It's a horrible, toxic truth that nobody dares speak, but just because nobody talks about it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.

Joe looks up at her. It surprises him sometimes just how much Charity looks like her daughter, in the right light: same eyes, same frown lines. Same tension across the shoulders that says  _don't hold me too tight_  and  _I break easily_.

Charity asks, "Is Debbie at the hospital?"

"Yes," he says. "She's staying the night, I think."

"God, she'll make herself ill. That's the last thing Sarah needs."

"She's just worried." Joe knows none of what he says is helping. He has felt like this for some time—a sideline motivator, pouring out all the right words when needed. Maybe it is because he's not a proper Dingle. Let's be honest—he will  _never_  be a proper Dingle. "Can't blame her."

"The doctors just—"

"The doctors are trying their best."

Joe leans forward to get his drink but she is still there, looking right at him. 

"Are you going back today? Because you know—"

"There are customers at the bar, Charity."

"—if Debbie asked you to stay away, she didn't mean it." 

There is challenge in her voice, like steel. It took Charity a long time to trust Joe and even now she still doesn't; she still remembers the way he'd played her, held a ball of string above her nose and watched her claw for it. They will probably never see eye to eye, but Joe doesn't care, because he loves Debbie, and Charity knows this. She has seen the way he looks at her. Like she put the stars in the sky, like she hung the moon.

Joe never thought he'd look at anyone else like that. He has only ever looked at one person in such a fashion, and that person is currently sat in Home Farm, leafing through paperwork and drinking coffee, black with two sugars.

(He used to take it straight black until Joe started making coffee for him. Two sugars, no less—it's tasteless otherwise.)

"She didn't ask me to stay away," he lies, "She just said she wanted space. To be with Sarah and Jack, you know how it is."

Charity pauses and relinquishes her efforts, finally and reluctantly. "Well," she says. "If that's what she wants."

"It is," Joe says. "Bye now."

 

Faith says, "You're doing fine." She is at the bar, nursing a gin. It is one o'clock in the afternoon. 

Joe looks up at her from his booth. He knows what she means. "Thanks. I'm trying."

"It's tough on everyone, love," Faith reassures him, then shakes her head. "All you can do is be solid for her."

He is solid; Joe feels like every muscle in his body is tensed. It makes him tired just thinking about it. "I'm trying."

"I know," Faith says, giving him a Dingle look that screams of family. God, he's had to work to earn that.

 

The thing is, version four of Joe is very new. It is the version of him that there is the least of; he is still growing, like a budding plant in the early days of May. Poking its head through the soil, feeling around for sunlight that it cannot yet see.

Joe doesn't know how to grow, not really.

Every other version of him has been stitched together of little bits: bruised knuckles, bank balance, empty eyes. There was nothing to grow because none of it was real. It can't grow if it's already dead.

But version four is nice. Version four buys chocolate bars for Jack and hoovers the upstairs landing, version four does the school run and brings Sarah her magazines. 

He thinks, maybe this one will stick. Maybe he will grow into this one, and it will fit him across the shoulders and around the waist—responsibility, the weight of Debbie and Sarah and Jack's worlds all at once.

 

Can you imagine any other version trying to do this? God. They'd have shit themselves.

 

-

 

He stays until the bell rings for last orders. By that point, Joe is well and truly drunk on expensive ale.

He likes being drunk, sometimes. It helps him go numb to everything, helps him forget about hospital and Sarah and his dad. 

It also helps him understand Graham a bit better. Sometimes, when he is drunk like this, he thinks about Graham; thinks about him in the way of hurricanes and whirlwinds. Of a light turning on a room full of darkness.

 

Vic says to him over the bar, "Come on, Joe, time to go home."

Joe nearly asks which home she means: Home Farm, Jacobs Fold. Hotten Academy, the groundsman's new office at four o'clock. Instead he says, "On my way," and goes.

 

-

 

It's late, the stars are up. 

Emmerdale looks so bleak when the sun goes down, all stone and fields and bad memories. There are spirits in the walls and in windows, suspended over passing cars. Joe knows that sometimes, when Graham looks hard enough, he can see his wife, in the right light. Pregnant, bleeding from the head and the ear.

His jaw still hurts from that day.

 

He'd deserved it, really: the punch, the battering. He'd woken up the next day and the grass was nice and cool, the air strange against his skin.

But seeing Graham like that—desperate, self-pitying,  _hammered_? It'd been awful. It made him feel like he was off-balance, but then again maybe he was always off-balance and didn't want to admit it.

 

Joe's world has been off balance since he was fifteen and saw smoke rising over the hill at school. 

 

-

 

Just picture it: 2010, mid-afternoon. Joseph Tate climbing through a window to save a stranger.

Chris and Rachel and Jean, everyone, they always said,  _you're fucking dramatic, Joe_. He supposes they were right.

He pulled himself into the hut and squinted through the smoke. It was terrifying but he could see someone there, under the rubble. Blood was pouring from his head.

 

Of course Graham was drunk. He always was back then.

Sometimes, Joe tries to think about what would have happened if Graham had died—he knows how lucky he is. Maybe, that is the reason he was there. Something in his brain had gone,  _don't walk away, someone in there needs you_.

 

Joe doesn't really remember what happened afterwards. Ambulances and IV drips or something. There had been paramedics swarming around them, flashing torches and checking pulses. Graham, mumbling incoherently, hands twisted in Joe's shirt to keep himself upright.

It had meant nothing to them at the time. 

 

-

 

Graham is getting old.

He knows this because when he gets out of bed his back hurts, and the sides of his head are going grey. His ankle twinges sometimes too, but that is the left-over ache of an old service wound, and serves as a painful reminder to always look at your feet when crossing marshland.

There are purple smudges under his eyes. This is not because of age; more because Joe Tate called him last night, off his face on scotch, and cried for hours.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves here—much like Graham and his relentless ageing.

Rewind a bit. 

 

Graham's phone goes off at two a.m. The house is quiet. Joe's name flashes across the screen in technicolour.

Graham sighs. He does not bother debating whether or not to answer because he knows that he will. He will always be there for Joe; he's been there since Joe was fifteen and made of Red Bull and smoke.

A voice says—slurs— _Graham._  It sounds drunk and desperate.  _Gray, I don't- I don't know what to do._

Go back a bit further. 

 

It is the previous day, four-thirty in the afternoon. They still aren't on proper speaking terms after the Incident with the booze but Joe's brought home fish and chips with Graham's slathered in curry sauce, and that is probably as much of a peace offering as he will offer. Joe has never really liked words, always more of an action guy.

 

The light in the living room is nice this time of day. It filters through the curtains, catches on Joe's eyelashes and chin.

It makes him look young, and soft, and vulnerable. 

Graham is sat in the armchair, peeling the batter off with his fork. It is times like this when he allows himself a proper look at Joe. The bruises have more or less healed, left only yellow spots that you only notice if you're looking for them, and the cut above his eyebrow is a little pink line. He shaved yesterday, there's a little nick on the base of his throat, by his Adam's apple. It moves whenever he swallows.

He looks like Zoe in the face, but has Chris' eyes. 

Graham never met Chris but he saw photos. Yes, Joe definitely has his eyes; the thousand-yard stare that makes you feel so small, so useless. A little bit of version three seeps in whenever Joe does it, but Graham knows how to deal with version three. It hurts, but he knows how to do it.

The show ends.

"All right," Joe says, scrunching up the chips paper. "I've gotta get to the hospital."

Oh yes, Sarah. Graham has no idea how she is—Joe has stopped talking about her, because whenever he does, his eyes go wet and his teeth clench and he's sick of Graham seeing him as weak.

Not that Graham ever would.

Joe is so strong. So, so strong.

"Is Debbie still there?" Graham asks, eyes careful.

"Yeah," Joe says. "The consultant wants to talk to her about Sarah's operation, so I want to be there for them."

Graham knows he is looking at him in disbelief. Luckily Joe doesn't see it, or there'd be accusations of all sorts flying. It is weird to see Joe Tate being such a family man. Nice, but weird.

"Do you want me to drive you?" Graham tries.

He knows the answer before Joe has the time to say  _no_ , toss the chip paper in the bin with newfound force. He's about to head to the bathroom.

"Joe," Graham says, and Joe stops, looks back. "She'll be okay."

Joe blinks. It bowls him over sometimes, how Graham can say something and make it feel so real. That's Graham to a T—efficent, wise, a doer. It surprises Joe just how much in that instant, he believes him, truly and wholly. Like everything Graham says is gospel because he is solid and clever and always there.

"I know," Joe says. He doesn't. He turns and goes upstairs, footsteps heavy and slow.

 

-

 

Graham wakes him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. "C'mon," he says, softly. "It's midday." He's smartly dressed—shirt, red tie, pressed suit—and has a mug of coffee in his hand which he holds out. Peace offering number two. 

It's bright out. Joe is laying on the couch. His head is absolutely pounding.

Joe rubs his eyes and takes the coffee, frowning at it. "Two sugars?" he manages to groan, because, priorities.

Graham nods and Joe sips at it tentatively, before sighing and taking a massive gulp. "Thanks," he says and puts it on the table. The world seems to tilt with him as he sits up, the floor undulating beneath his feet. His skull feels like it's about to implode.

"You had a rough night," Graham says. "I took care of all the calls that came in and moved the meeting with the Walkers to Thursday. They're pretty determined to see you."

"How old am I, eight?" Joe grumbles, sitting up. The newly-healed split of his lip throbs like a drum. "I can manage with them."

Graham says nothing. Hungover Joe can  _do_  nothing but nurse his sore head and drink litres of black coffee to sober himself up. Graham has spent many nights dealing with Hungover Joe, enough for it to basically be another version of him. Sometimes Joe drinks a lot when he's dealing with stuff. It worries Graham—he knows where that leads, knows from experience.

 

He probably should mention it, shouldn't he?

The air goes still when Graham says, "Debbie called." Just those two words sound so impending and awful. They also make Joe bolt upright like a man reborn, but his eyes are wide with fear and he looks like a scared teenage boy again.

"What did she say?"

Graham's eyes go soft and he pauses, one hand on the arm of the sofa. Waiting.

Then it clicks in Joe's head. "The consultant.  _Shit_."

"Let me drive you," Graham says. His voice is an order.

Joe gets up and pulls on a jacket from the coat tree, the one he'd called stupid when Graham bought it but has since grown to love. Graham's coat hangs just below, a brown shapeless mass. "No, it's fine, I'll—"

" _Joe_." 

It's a revelation how he does it. Just the way Graham speaks and Joe stops, turns all of his body towards him; it's not an authority thing anymore, it's just a Joe thing. "Let me drive you. You're in no fit state to go by yourself."

There's a pause. The air shimmers in the strip lighting, the silent humming of the bulbs.

"Okay," Joe says, relenting. "Okay. Get the keys."

 

Joe is as unenthusiastic as expected, but it's not out of a held grudge anymore. His forehead is creased and he's tying knots in the seatbelt, focused on the passing blur out the window, mind going a thousand miles an hour. Graham thinks he's imagining horror stories and worse-cases. The doctor saying,  _sorry, there's nothing we can do_.

Graham hands him a flask of tea, and Joe rides up in the front for the first time—well,  _ever_. 

They pass through most of the drive in silence. The traffic clogs up in Hotten and Graham can feel Joe tensing up beside him, so he turns the radio on, the station Joe likes; it's a bit upbeat for him this time of day but Joe starts to tap along to it on his lap, so he lets it go.

Finally Joe says, "I didn't mean it."

Graham looks at him out the corner of his eye. "Didn't mean what?"

Joe shrugs, sipping his tea. Every inch of him is away from Graham, leaning out of the window like Graham is white-hot, too hot to be close to. "What I said," he says. "When you were trollied."

The traffic light goes from red to amber.

It's not often Joe makes the first step. Graham takes a breath and decides it's best to meet him there.

"I know you didn't," he says, and then, because it's important to be clear about these things, "You said what you—thought would work."

Joe inspects his fingernails. "It was uncalled for," he continues. 

Graham swallows hard. "It was."  _And it was uncomfortably true_ , but he doesn't have the—strength? ability?—to say that out loud. It worms its way from his subconscious, some horrible, festering truth.

One which a bottle of scotch can't even silence.

"But," Graham says. The radio begins playing some conspicuously jaunty tune. Joe leans forward and turns it off. "What I did to you was unforgivable."

The bruises and cuts aren't hurting him anymore, but Joe winces when he thinks about it: the looming figure, the fist against his cheekbones, his trust being shattered into tiny pieces with each blow over and over,  _I gave up on you a long time ago, you're past saving, you're a soulless husk of a man—_

Joe nods slightly, looks down. "It was," he says.

Someone beeps a horn, which triggers a chorus of them down the entire line of traffic. Graham wishes he could put the world on silent, focus on Joe and just Joe like he has done for years. Like he wants to for the rest of his life, if Joe will let him. If Joe wants him to.

Graham would do anything for Joe. Hot coals, piranhas, heartbreak, you name it.

Joe chews his lip. "Seven years is a long time to just throw away."

Graham was seven years sober. It has also been seven years since he met Joe. And no, it isn't a coincidence. Joe knows this too: for the first time in the entire journey he is looking at Graham, eyes wide and blue. He looks like a small animal, cautious. 

"I know," Graham says. "This clinic — it will help. They'll kick some sense into me."  _Probably literally._  "And while I'm gone, you can focus on Debbie and Sarah."

Debbie and Sarah: his new project, his new investment. At first Graham was sceptical and had good reason to be—watching version three sink his claws in and ripping the Dingle home by its very foundations from the ground—but he has seen Joe go out of his way in ways he never has before for her. It's the reason they're sat in traffic at midday and cancelling very important business meetings. 

Joe is too version three right now to be sentimental. He says, "A group of squaddies won't be enough to turn you off it. Not if seven years dry wasn't."

"Have a little faith," Graham says. His voice is as dry as the summer heat. 

"Well," Joe begins. "Something clearly worked the first time around. What was it?"

The traffic light finally turns green, and Graham kicks the pedal. They roll forward as he replies, "Nearly dying certainly brought things into perspective."

Joe hums, turning the flask around in his hands. "Can't recreate that. Sorry," he says, and then he sighs. "I don't want to be careful around you, Graham. I don't want to be hiding all the bottles of wine and—"

"You won't have to—"

"I thought so too," Joe argues. He's right, undeniably. "But look what happened." The shadow on his jaw undulates as he swallows, as if emphasising the point.

There is no dog in Graham's corner. He says, "And I will spend my life apologising for that."

"I don't want you to have to. That's my point."

Version four is seeping in; family man, sympathetic. Or—is this version two?

"I know it doesn't mean much now," Graham says as the sign for Hotten General comes into view. "But I would never hurt you intentionally." A ripple passes through Joe's body, a suppressed scoff which Graham doesn't have to see to register. "You know I wouldn't. I was just— I don't want to say that it wasn't  _me_ , because it was. It was the worst possible version of me."

"Yeah," Joe says, and it sounds like he has gone all soft around the eyes: version two, a rare but beautiful sight. "I know."

 

"So, we're—we're alright?" Graham taps his fingers on the steering wheel. "Ambivalent, at least."

"So long as you promise me— _promise_ ," Joe says, eyebrows raised in silent pleading, "you never touch a drop ever again. Ever. I mean it, Graham."

Graham's eyes drop to where Joe has spilt tea on the leather seat, a tiny splash just sitting there. "Of course," he says, voice neutral. "You're cleaning that up."

Joe looks down and huffs. "I take it all back," he grumbles, but the sun's beating down and the sky is a brilliant blue and it's so warm, so bright. The clouds in the sky are the shapes that they are in dreams.

This is progress. Graham smiles to himself a little; it's  _something_.

 

-

 

Hospitals are fucking grim. Graham has always hated them. They smell like morphine and dead people.

They charge through the double doors and down the corridor, Joe knowing the way to the room from muscle memory and Debbie is there, pacing back and forth, wearing the floor thin. When she sees him she careens forward, throws his arms around Joe's shoulders. There are tears in her eyes.

"Debbie," he breathes, relieved. "Debs, how is— am I late, is—"

"The consultant's waiting now," she says. She sounds suspiciously like she has been crying. "You look awful, are you alright?"

Joe's eyes meet Graham for a second before he looks back. "Bad night's sleep."

 

She begins to tug him into the room, a small dungeon-looking thing with machinery that would make a space station jealous, when Graham steps forward. "I'll wait in the car," he says. Professional, businessman-like.

It's Joe who stops him; grabs his sleeve. It looks casual but Graham feels the clutch of his fingers, curled around his forearm. "No," he says, a little too quickly. "No, you can wait here. Please."

Joe Tate is rarely terrified, but this is definitely one of those moments.

Graham places a hand on top of Joe's: quick enough to be friendly, long enough to say everything it needs to.

"Of course," he says. "Whatever you wish."

 

They're gone for ages. The consultant clearly has some issues to go through and every second makes Graham more uncomfortable—the plastic chair is too hard and there's no air-con and there's a gentle stream of lifeless people rolling by like cargo packages. 

(The last time Graham was here, it was for Joe. 

Only version three would jump off a fucking quarry to impress his fourteen-year-old step-brother. It hadn't stopped the fear, though.  _Are you his next of kin? Yes._

_Debbie, I think? She gave him CPR. Saved his life._

He thinks, that is where he lost him. That is where version four emerged: new and shiny and caring and Debbie's. Version three stayed in the lake and only comes out when needed.)

Before that it was the quad bike incident.

Before that it was—

Graham swallows and looks down at his coffee that has since gone cold. The milk floats at the top, separating.

He really fucking hates hospitals.

 

-

 

Version three of Joseph Tate is probably Graham's least favourite version of him, because it is not really Joseph Tate at all.

 

Tom Waterhouse is an arsehole, an arsehole to the bones, to the tips of his quiffed-up hair. This version appeared sometime after daddy's fortune did, some ugly split personality, Christian Bale in American Psycho. Graham tries with him, as much as one can try with a spoiled rich boy hopped up on arrogance; he talks to him, and he loves him, and when he needs to he puts some force into his voice and his fists and it makes Tom bow. 

He does it a lot. Tom has a nasty habit of breaking hearts. 

 

-

 

It doesn't dawn on Graham until long after Joe and Debbie have come out of the office that shit, Sarah is ill. 

Sarah is  _so_ ill.

 

Joe is being strong. He's strong anyway, but he is being especially strong for Debbie. He is being as version four as he can be, newly-made and freshly-packaged and able to withstand traumas like brutal beatings and childhood illness. Graham has an ugly feeling in his heart whenever he looks at Joe that feels like sympathy but also anger: he shouldn't have to feel like that. He shouldn't have to bottle it all up like this.

But that is Joe, and Joe does not like emoting. It comes with the model, unfortunately.

 

Debbie is in with Sarah. Graham and Joe are sat outside the room, watching through the stripes of the blinds.

Graham starts. "I'm assuming that it wasn't good news."

Joe's eyes don't move, but they are hazy and unfocused. "Because she's so young," he says, "they're struggling to find a heart that matches. One that's the right size, cause she's just a kid." His voice kind of breaks on  _kid_ , but he hides it with a cough.

"Is the list long?"

"It's—immense."

"Mmhmm."

"And they said that the anxiety it causes... just makes it more difficult. The last thing she needs is stress but it's all she's doing." 

"She's convinced she's going to die?"

Joe nods, solemnly. 

Graham wants to hug him. Wants to wrap his arms around him and pull him close and tell him everything will be okay. But he can't, because this is Joseph Tate and they are in a hospital ward and they each have their own problems to deal with first, before they can help each other.

(Although maybe all they  _need_  is each other. Maybe that's the key to it all.)

Joe leans forward, chewing on his nails. He makes eye contact with Sarah and smiles, winks at her but then the expression melts away and he is sad again. If he had dog ears, they'd be pulled back to the floor right now. "If she dies—"

"She's not going to die," Graham says. Cool, calm.

"You don't know that."

"Neither do you. So there's no point worrying about it."

"Am I supposed to just ignore it?"

"I didn't say that." Joe's shoulder is there, hunched and knotted, and Graham just wants to reach out and twist his fingers in the fabric of his shirt and hold on. So he does. Tentatively, like Joe might jump and skitter away at the touch. Graham wouldn't blame him. Last time he touched him, he knocked some teeth out. "Nobody would ask you to ignore this."

Joe doesn't jump. He looks back, and Graham sees that he is trembling, just ever so slightly. There is a hurricane inside of him that wants to burst out. 

"I hate this," he admits. "Just—feeling so helpless."

Money can't fix this, much to version three's dismay. Running away and smashing shit up won't help either, so that's version one off the table too. All version four knows how to do, really, is buy hot chocolate from the vending machine and kiss Debbie's forehead and offer empty  _she'll be okay_ s. Version two is Graham's—he's no help whatever.

"You can't control everything in life," Graham says. "Sometimes you just have to sit back and let life decide what to do."

He scoffs humourlessly. "And if life decides t— just says fuck it?"

Graham has seen life say  _fuck it_ , if you will, several times. He dealt with it the wrong way back then. "Then we deal with it."

Another scoff, this one bitter. "Deal with it," Joe echoes. "That's your mantra for everything." And then, as if he's just read his mind, "And the way you  _deal with things_ —"

"Is in the past," Graham finishes, his mouth a straight line. It has just enough steel in it to make Joe's shoulders fall, make his held breath escape through his nose and to become soft and pliable beneath Graham's palm. "All you need to think about now is Sarah. Don't think about what's coming. Just stay in the here and now."

They're going round in circles. Joe reclines and shifts so when Graham tries to remove his hand, it stays on Joe's body, a comforting weight nestled on the crook of his elbow. Something to ground him back to the cheap plastic and the squeaky floor, because Joe feels like he might float away at any minute.

 

Graham smells like cologne, the fancy stuff that Joe got him last Christmas. 

It must be intoxicating, because Joe hears himself murmur, "I know I told you to go, but— you are coming back, aren't you?" Big eyes, blue and fifteen-years-old again. "After the clinic?"

"Of course," Graham says. "If you want me to."

"I want you to," Joe says, before he falls asleep, right there in the hospital waiting room. Right there on Graham's shoulder.

 

-

 

It's raining when they get home. The sky is fully grey, miserable and wet, abnormal for early August. It falls in icy sheets and gets down the back of Graham's collar and through his hair.

Joe wants a drink. He's looking at the wine rack, cautious, stealing uncertain glances. 

"Have one if you want one," Graham says. 

Joe reaches for a bottle—whiskey, copper-coloured with a fancy stopper. More money than it could possibly be worth. "You sure?" he says. There's a smirk in his words. "You're not going to break out in hives, are you?"

Graham glares, unimpressed. It makes Joe reach up into a cupboard and stash it there, close the door with a little force. "There. It can't hurt either of us now."

 

-

 

It was whiskey Graham was hammered on when he set the hut on fire. He couldn't tell you how he did it; dropped a cigarette, maybe, knocked over a can of something and passed out before realising it had caught. It had been scary; he'd been shaken awake to a black sky and the smell of smoke and a baby face looking down at him, hands on his chest, begging him to wake up. 

The paramedics said several miracles had occurred that day. One: that he'd even survived the smoke inhalation (he'd spent weeks on a respirator in the hospital afterwards, coughing up tar until his eyes watered). Two: that a fifteen-year-old boy had not only stopped to help but even managed to pull an unconscious man from the rubble. 

The nurse was a young girl, blonde haired. She'd taken Graham's vitals and smiled sweetly at him and said,  _the little fella must really love you._

 _I've never spoken to him,_  he said.  _I've no idea who he is._

 _Oh_ , she said.  _Well— that's something, isn't it?_

 _Isn't it just_?

He'd had no desire to talk to him. Maybe just out of courtesy, thanks for saving my life, that sort of thing. I never wanted you to save it, but thanks anyway. 

 _Kids these days,_  she'd continued. He was being fed something pinkish-coloured through an IV.  _Most of them are little rascals and then you get ones like him. I tell you what—we all like to say we'd help in these situations, but diving head-first into a burning building? God. Takes a lot to do that._

Graham asked for this kid's name, to shut her up more than anything.

 _I think it's Joe, pet,_ she'd said.  _I think he's still here. Want me to go and fetch him?_

 

-

 

Noah comes round the next day.

Joe and Graham go to a pub to get some breathing space (not the Woolie, they'd get too many looks) and when they come home Noah is sat cross-legged on the hood of Joe's car, wearing sunglasses and a bright orange hoodie. He looks surprisingly like little Joe from a distance, if little Joe had been blonde and, you know, not a hot mess.

 

Joe ruffles his hair,  _hello_. Noah smiles beneath his hand like a praised puppy.

"Mum's gone mental," he says, looking up. "Ross got done again for stealing cars, so now there's no one to look after Moses. They were just getting going when I came over."

"Fun weekend," Joe deadpans. "We're missing out."

"He'll probably try and nick this next." The car's a convertible, silver and sporty. Graham's favourite one to drive. "How much is it worth?"

Joe smirks; Graham notices, they have the same face. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Ten grand?" he tries. Bless—Noah's sweet. Innocent. To say how much shit he's been through, Joe would expect him to be much more rebellious—burning things and skipping school, smoking cigarettes behind bike sheds. But then maybe it's a good thing that Noah isn't at all like little Joe, because little Joe had Graham, whereas Noah only has Joe, and dear God, he wouldn't wish himself on any kid.

Joe shrugs. "More or less."

"Twelve?"

"If you find this car for twelve grand, it's probably one that Ross has nicked," Joe says, dry. 

"Not a habit I'd recommend taking up," Graham pipes up. The sun has come out, shining down on all of them. The air smells like pollen. 

"With me and Charity as role models? Please. You're on the straight and narrow, aren't you kiddo?"

Noah beams, bright as the sun itself.

Graham smiles to himself too. Small and fleeting, but there. He never had this with young Joe—loose smiles, exchanged jokes—because Graham was too stoic and Joe was too breakable and they couldn't hug because what if one of them shattered? Joe's already pieced together Graham's heart once before. He'll be damned if he makes him do it again.

"Have you got much on today?" Noah asks.

Joe puts his hands in his pockets. "Is that your way of asking if you can hang out here?"

Noah shrugs and says, "Well, have you?"

A beat, and Joe looks over at Graham, who simply nods back in understanding: yes, he'll cancel the Walker meeting again.

"Course I've not," Joe says. "Pizza's on us."

 

They spend the whole day there. Graham in his armchair, Joe and Noah on the chaise lounge with a Domino's on their lap and video games on the television. It's nice—or, it distracts Joe from everything, and that is enough for Graham.

This is version four, Graham decides. When Noah had first shown up, he had met version three, completely and entirely. There was Joe, rich and desperate to impress (and get one-up on Charity Dingle which, y'know, bonus) and jumping off of cliffs and nearly dying, chest puffed out like a peacock. Of course Debbie was there to save him. Graham was too busy with fucking Meghan of all people—no, there are no feelings left for her. They hadn't even been feelings, really, just a sensation he'd needed to feel—to do it himself.

If you asked Graham to pinpoint the moment version four was born, it would be then. Joe, soft and broken in a hospital bed. His ego lying in tatters around him.

 

"I've got to spend more time with him," Joe says after Noah's gone, chucking the pizza box in a bin. His hair is stuck up in spikes after grappling with Noah for his controller. What can he say? He's a sore loser. "All this mess with Sarah— Charity's probably forgotten he exists."

Another world drops onto his shoulders. Graham sees it. "He's not your responsibility."

"He's family," Joe frowns, offended. "Of course he is."

"If you start worrying about him too— don't give me that look, you know you will," Graham says, taking off his jacket and slinging it over the back of the chair. "You'll start stressing. And you don't do that like a normal person. You take it too far every time."

"Oh,  _I_ take it too far," Joe counters.

"Robert Sugden," Graham says, flatly.

Joe sniffs and looks down at his feet. His shoes are lovely. They're new, very expensive. His first pair of proper posh shoes were hand-me-downs from Graham. They were a size too big and he had to stuff them with cotton wool to make them fit but he wore them until the soles fell off.

"Besides," Graham continues. "We both know my weakness. You bottle things up and then someone else bears the brunt of it. I know you're worried about Sarah—"

"You say this like you didn't just almost kill me the other week."

"If we're ever going to progress past that—"

"Just like that?" Joe says. His teeth are gritted. "I'm supposed to forget about it?"

"Did I say that?"

Graham is—so calm. Inside, he is burning. Inside, he is tearing himself up into little shreds with anger because those holes he made in Joe's face are never going to fully heal, are they? The bruises will fade and cuts will disappear but they'll always be there for Joe—version three—to use against him when needed. 

Joe chews on his bottom lip. "You think I'm being melodramatic—"

"I don't."

"Why?" His voice is a whisper. It shakes slightly, like he's holding something in. "I really wanted you to prove me wrong. But you didn't. Why not?"

Graham looks down. "Joe— I can't have this conversation with you."

"You told me everything before. That was— that was  _us_. You knew you could talk to me but you  _didn't_."

"I needed to talk to myself first," Graham says, and his voice is very quiet too now. This is rare: Joe has heard Graham shout until his chest hurts, cry until his lungs are red raw but rarely does he hear him like this. "There are a long of things from that day—from that life, even—that I still haven't faced. And a bottle of scotch looked more appealing than admitting things to myself." 

He looks at Joe, whose knuckles are white on the desktop counter. 

"I don't expect you to understand," Graham says. "I'm not asking you to."

Joe sighs. "What haven't you told me, Graham? There's definitely something. I'm not going anywhere until you tell me."

 

There is a plethora of things that he hasn't told Joe. They are somewhere deep inside of him, black and ugly and pulsating and Graham can't get them out of his head. He had been so— it was a long time ago and he thought he had forgotten, thought he could ignore it all and swallow it down but then he saw Joe with Debbie and then his wife, blood on her face, that day and his phone had rung and it had been that number, that  _fucking_  number which he recognised immediately— 

The last time that number had called him, he killed his wife and daughter.

That's nothing if not symbolic, is it?

 

"I've told you everything you need to know," Graham says. His voice is hard and firm:  _that is enough_.

Joe breathes hard out of his nose, but nods. "Okay."

 

-

 

Graham packs that night. He's due at the clinic tomorrow and it's a good three-hour drive, so he needs to set off early.

He takes old clothes, because there's no point taking suits if he's going to be having the figurative and literal shit kicked out of him for a month. Razor, shaving foam, shower gel, all the essentials. The cologne Joe got him last year. A framed photo of them he keeps on his bedside table—two years ago, Tom Waterhouse opening his business. Grinning like a Cheshire cat with his arm around Graham, resting on his shoulders.

He doesn't want to go. But he has to—for Joe, for his wife, for himself. 

 

Graham's facing his demons, but before that he spent a long time running.

Bravery is hard to find but you'll always find it. Joe is brave. Graham learnt from the best. The battlefield is nothing compared to this.

 

Joe sits in the front room, nursing a coffee between his palms. His brain has been churning for the past few hours. Whenever he thinks about his jaw, it starts to hurt. Whenever he thinks about Graham, his heart beats a little faster.

He should probably offer to help him pack, but if he does, that will make the whole thing real. So he doesn't.

 

"Just for a few weeks," Graham says, bag slung over his shoulder. He needs a shave and his eyes are sunken with fatigue. "It'll get it all out of my system."

"If you're sure," Joe says. "You seem confident that it'll work, I guess."

Seven years dry didn't work last time. He had a big house and a good salary, and Joe, and that didn't work either. 

"It will work," Graham nods. "Squaddies are tough bastards, even after they've retired. They'll put me in my place. Don't think about me— Debbie needs you more than I do." Graham doesn't lie to Joe very often, but this is one of those times. "Tell her that I'm thinking about her."

Joe breathes out, soft and shuddering, and so he knows that it's serious business. "Take care of yourself, yeah?" It sounds far away. Graham feels like he is full of hot air, empty and weightless.

"Likewise," he nods, before going back to his room.

 

-

 

It's six in the morning when Joe and Graham load the car. The village is still sleepy, a light breeze sweeps through and makes them shiver. Graham wanted to take the train but Joe said  _let me drive you_ and Graham said  _no._  There is too much Joe in this journey, in his heart; having him there would probably finish him off.

 

When Joe was fifteen years old, he risked everything to save some stranger in a burning hut.

Now he is twenty-three and they are stood in their driveway together, tired and hungry and wanting to say so much to each other but they can't, because the last time they tried to do that it ended so badly, so, so badly. 

He's scared for Graham. He loves him. Everybody he knows is leaving.

 

"Do you like it here?" Joe asks, unexpectedly. It kind of blurts out. "Are you happy?" He winces. "I know it's not— the best of circumstances, I guess."

Graham blinks. "I haven't really been happy in a long time," he admits, like a confession. The rosebush in the front garden is in full bloom, an umbrella of pink and red. "Not since—" He trails off. It's difficult to explain.

"Because you loved her?"

"No," he says. "That's not why. You were right, when you said it."  _You didn't even love her, did you?_

Joe shakes his head, scuffs his shoes on the pavement. "You took my teeth out for saying that."

"It hurt too much," Graham says. "When you said it. It made it real."

Something flashes through Joe's eyes. He presses his lips together to make a harsh line and refuses to meet Graham's eyes.

Graham steps closer. "I like it here," he says. "I feel good here. I'm starting to, I think."

Joe huffs. "This is the most miserable place I've ever lived in. I feel bad for dragging you here."

It's here where Graham realises that he is smiling, just a little. His heart is a puddle in his chest. "You're here," he says. "That's all I need."

 

Joe looks him in the eyes for the first time all day, and he has gone all soft around the mouth and the chest and the face: he is open and whole and— version two. This is version two Joe, in the flesh. 

We haven't spoken about version two yet, have we?

He's a rare occurrence, a phenomenon. He appears in early mornings when he is soft and pliable in Graham's arms, or during late nights when he is tipsy and giggly and looking at Graham like he hung the stars, like everything he says is God's honest truth. He smells like Graham's borrowed coat and expensive aftershave and god, he  _loves_  him, loves him so much that he has to go. He simply has to. It's the way their hand has been dealt.

 

Joe hugs him. Short and quick, but his arms are tight and his stubble brushes against Graham's chin and he thinks, he can feel Joe's shoulders shake. 

"Stay strong," Graham says, into Joe's coat. 

Joe says, "I've never thanked you." He says it depreciating, regretful. "For any of it." 

Graham pulls away, keeps a hand of Joe's shoulder. The fabric feels nice to ball up in his fist.

"Don't thank me," he says. "Make me proud."

 

-

**Author's Note:**

> title from kelvin jones. come talk to me on [tumblr](http://turnerkanes.tumblr.com) and [twitter](http://twitter.com/bartonholla)!


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